


Passions of a Man

by yuletide_archivist



Category: Batman Begins (2005)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-12-21
Updated: 2005-12-21
Packaged: 2018-01-25 04:23:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,794
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1631318
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yuletide_archivist/pseuds/yuletide_archivist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Old men once were young.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Passions of a Man

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Stewardess

 

 

)0(

Lucius Fox is dreaming when the phone rings. It is a bleak dream of things that rustle and skitter along the edges of shadows and hiss when he passes by. The darkness is a thing itself, waiting.

It lingers with him the long, quiet drive out to Wayne Manor. It's a ghost risen from the ashes, perfect and pale under the light of the half moon above.

Alfred has the door open even before he is even at the top step. "Thank-you for coming."

Lucius smiles at him. "How bad is he?"

"Bad," Alfred says, his face stone.

For two old men, they take the stairs pretty damn quickly.

Bruce is wild against his sheets, his face twisted in a disfiguring grimace, and he's laughing. It's torn from him; it sounds raw and wet, like someone who's been screaming for hours. Lucius drops his bag and Alfred grabs one of Bruce's arms, somehow holds it still while Lucius pulls up the vein and pulls four vials of blood out. "I'll call you as soon as I get anything."

Alfred nods his thanks; he doesn't show him out.

)0(

_Gotham is a wicked, wicked town, Lucius thinks as he steps off the Number Four bus and onto the street. He thinks, perhaps, that is what he likes best about it. He scans the street until he sees the club his cousin had told him about. Albert Ayler and Cecil Taylor -- it promises to be quite a night._

Within a couple of hours the place is packed, and he finds himself sharing his table with strangers. One of them, a tall, blond man, offers to buy him a drink, and he holds up his soda water and shakes his head. The man smiles, shrugs and turns his attention back to the stage until the set is over. When Ayler and Taylor take a break, he turns back to Lucius and smiles again. "Can I buy you another soda water now?" and this time Lucius accepts. He has a very nice smile.

Gotham is very wicked, indeed.

)0(

The labs are empty at Wayne Tech, and Lucius is grateful. Over the last couple of years he's gotten a reputation for spot inspections at all hours, most especially in R&D. In the end it works out well, since it means he rarely has to bring up things like ethics to his staff.

He starts pulling samples, sending them through for analysis. He thinks that somehow they need to figure out a way to shrink the analysis lab down so that Bruce can have one at home, since his social life seemed to get him into this sort of trouble on a semi-annual basis.

He'll make a note for R&D. It could be marketed to their law enforcement contracts.

)0(

_When Ayler takes up his saxophone again they are on a first name basis, and sitting a lot closer than the crowding strictly necessitates, and Lucius' blood is singing with the music, free form and a little wild. Under the table their thighs brush, and it makes Lucius ache with something he isn't supposed to want._

In Gotham, the forbidden suddenly seems ... far too possible.

)0(

By the time Lucius is back at Wayne Manor Alfred's stripped down to his shirtsleeves and Bruce is tied to the bed, laughing like a hyena. His mouth is still twisted in a snarl pretending to be a smile. Two minutes after Lucius has injected his shoulder he's limp on the sheets, breathing slow and deep, his body finally relaxed.

"Thank _Christ_ ," Alfred says, and Lucius turns to look at him.

"Bet you didn't think these were the recreational drugs you'd be dealing with when you agreed to be his guardian?" Lucius says.

Alfred rubs the back of his neck tiredly. "No, I can't say that they were," he agreed. He straightens then, slower than normal but still sliding into the perfect servant. "Can I make you some coffee, Mr. Fox?"

Lucius laughs. "For God's sake, Alfred, if we're up all night taking care of that boy together, you can call me Lucius. It's not like you haven't before. And I'd love some tea, but only if you'll have some, too."

Alfred smiles. "Truth is I'd like something a fair bit stronger, but we'll stick to tea for now. I'll bring it up in a tick, if you don't mind...?" he nods towards the bed, and Lucius sits in the chair Alfred had obviously been using.

Bruce stirs once, while Alfred's gone. Lucius pats his hand until he drifts back into deeper sleep.

"He'll probably sleep for a long time," Lucius says when Alfred returns carrying a tray. It's loaded with a teapot, mugs and teabags and sugar and cream and little cinnamon cookies. Lucius makes himself a mug of Orange Pekoe and pops a cookie into his mouth. "It was a neurotoxin, and he's going to feel sick as a dog for a week from it. You really need a doctor for him. A discreet doctor."

"I know," Alfred says. "Unfortunately, most of the doctors in Gotham knew his parents and ... Master Bruce is unwilling to risk the exposure."

Lucius grabs another biscuit, thinks. "Leslie Thomkins," he says. "She runs a clinic in the inner city."

Alfred blinks. "That just might work."

"It might," Lucius agrees. "I've got my case and my laptop in the car, and if you don't mind I think I need to spend the day tomorrow with Mr. Wayne going over current operations at Wayne Enterprises. While my secretary will no doubt dislike having to changes my schedule, she won't be unduly surprised. Mr. Wayne's noted for his ... capricious whims."

"Isn't he just?" Alfred says, and it sounds grudgingly fond. "Damn stubborn boy."

"He's his father's son," Lucius says, and Alfred snorts, smiles.

"To fathers and sons," Alfred says finally, holding his mug up in a toast. Lucius leans forward, clinks their mugs together.

"Fathers and sons," he agrees.

)0(

_It's almost one in the morning when the club clears out and the buses have all stopped running. They walk over the Narrows Bridge, and up the side streets to his apartment. They spend the next hour putting on records as quietly as the speaker will go and drinking coffee._

Somewhere in the middle of "Oh Yeah" they start kissing. Eventually there is only the faint hiss of static, the rain outside and the sound of their breath and bodies on the narrow bed in his room.

It plays in his head like the best kind of jazz all the next day.

)0(

He's awake again before dawn. He considers just lying in bed trying to find sleep again but decides against it, and instead goes down to the kitchen to make himself coffee. The pot's half made before Alfred shuffles in, half asleep and still his robe.

"Bless you," he says.

"Better than turning water into wine," Lucius agrees. "Did he wake up at all?"

"Once, during the night, briefly. He tried to get up, but since his legs weren't working properly, he decided to fall back asleep instead." Alfred shakes his head.

"I don't remember ever being that young," Lucius says. "But we must have been, right?"

"Not me," Alfred says. "I was born old. At least it feels that way, some days."

Lucius reaches out, lays his hand on the other man's shoulder. He lets his fingers dig in, kneads the heavy muscle that age has yet to strip away from Alfred. "The young can make you feel that way. They think everything they feel, do, think is so ... new. They think it always has to be extremes ... everything or nothing." He feels Alfred's shoulder drop, release, and he brings his other hand up, starts working the other shoulder.

"The young are frequently stupid," Alfred says dryly.

"I know I was," Lucius agrees, and smiles at the memory. "But we can still have our moments, even now." He pulls Alfred in slightly, shortens the distance between them. "This would be one of those moments, I think," he says, and then he kisses Alfred once, almost chastely, for the first time in over forty years.

Alfred smiles against his kiss. "I thought we agreed this was a bad idea?"

"It was a bad idea, forty years ago," Lucius agrees. "But right now it just seems like the only sensible thing to do."

Alfred laughs and leans his head onto Lucius' shoulder. "My bedroom," he says finally, "is down the hall."

)0(

_Lucius is nervous enough that he thinks he might swallow his own tongue when Mr. Wayne steps into the elevator with him. He's a big man, with bushy white eyebrows and a firm, thin mouth. But he smiles at Lucius, nods politely. "You're new here," he says. "Walk me to the car, tell me what you think of the place so far."_

Lucius walks beside him, telling him about the lab he works in, about the project he's been assigned to, all the way out to the curb where Mr. Wayne's car is waiting. The chauffer is standing with the door open, and it takes a minute to realize that he knows him, that he knows him very, very well indeed.

He opens his mouth, but the chauffer shakes his head imperceptibly and instead Lucius only wishes Mr. Wayne a good evening.

Two nights later Alfred's on his couch, and they're listening to "Oh Yeah" and they're agreeing that this is a very bad idea.

The next day there is no music in Lucius at all.

)0(

Bruce wakes up around four o'clock in the afternoon. "How long?" His voice is deep and rough, not truly his own.

"Since you were poisoned? About sixty hours. You've had the antidote in your system about fifteen hours." Lucius sets his laptop down on the floor beside the chair. "How are you feeling?"

"Like shit," Bruce says after a moment's thought. "I need a shower."

"I wasn't going to say anything," Lucius says. He presses the switch by Bruce's bed, and Alfred is there within an astonishingly short period of time.

"I'll draw you a bath, Master Bruce, with salts. That'll help with the muscle fatigue," he says briskly. "What would you like to eat after?"

"Tomato soup," Bruce says. Lucius watches as Alfred helps him into the ensuite, waits until he returns. He stands, packs his laptop up, and then turns and takes Alfred by the shoulders.

"This is still a bad idea," Alfred says ruefully, after.

"No it's not," Lucius says. "It's an idea whose time has come."

He lets himself out of the house, and when he goes to bed that night his dreams are full of nothing but music.

)0(

End

 

 

 


End file.
